In Atkins and Levin (1995), they talk about the distinction made in Levin and Rappaport Hovav (1995) between externally caused verbs and internally caused verbs.
Externally caused verbs describe events with an external cause. An example that Atkins and Levin give is the verb "open". They give the example of a door opening as an event with an external cause. Externally caused verbs can be used transitively with the external cause as the subject of the sentence (e.g. Albert opened the door). Another way of thinking of verbs like these is that the event they describe cannot occur of its own accord.
Internally caused verbs describe events with an internal cause. By internally caused verbs, Atkins and Levin mean verbs describing events that "cannot be externally controlled but can be controlled only by the person engaging in [the event in question]." In other words, the subject of an internally caused verb is the source of the event that verb describes. An example that Atkins and Levin give is the verb "speak". A person speaks, but a person cannot literally speak for another person.
Atkins and Levin go on to discuss their findings about the correlation between internally and externally caused verbs and causative uses. However, I want to stay with discussion of this distinction to explore some questions about the ramifications technological advances might have on the applicability of this distinction.
Take the verb "drive", as in to drive a car. To me, this seems like an externally caused verb because you can use it transitively with an external cause as its subject (e.g. Jonathan drives the car). But what do we do now that the technology exists for autonomous cars that can drive themselves? It seems like with this advance of technology, what used to clearly be an externally caused verb might also be an internally caused verb as the car being driven is now the source of the driving. But then again the car does not really have will or control; it is a computer programmed by people, but there still seems to me something difficult to reconcile with this distinction. Would this model still hold or how do linguists account for this?
My interest in this example is not to try and show a flaw with this model of distinguishing between types of verbs. Rather, it got me thinking about how our use of language changes with the advances in technology that we make. We start using words in new ways that make sense to us, but apply to entirely new events that were not possible when those words were created. This makes me think that linguists must constantly revise their theories and models to accommodate our ever-changing use of language and the way the advances we make in technology and automation break our former notions of causality.
I think you're right that the advent of autonomous driving might make using "drive" as an "internal" verb commonplace. I think it might also popularize some interesting expressions that are more ambiguous and might throw into question the internal/external distinction. For instance, I am not sure how Atkins and Levin would categorize "the car drives itself" or "the AI program drives the car."
ReplyDeleteI think you're right that the advent of autonomous driving might make using "drive" as an "internal" verb commonplace. I think it might also popularize some interesting expressions that are more ambiguous and might throw into question the internal/external distinction. For instance, I am not sure how Atkins and Levin would categorize "the car drives itself" or "the AI program drives the car."
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